Tuesday, August 4, 2015

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“OK, what prompted you to do this?”

Anthony Coleman, “I want to encourage people to represent love in their life. I believe that love is the energy that flows through all of life. I think that all human beings have the potential to love, but I think there’s a problem that most people don’t realize they have the potential to love, so I want to remind people of that potential.”

“OK, do you find that people are becoming less loving now, or more loving?”

“I’d say less loving, only because they don’t know what real love is. I believe they aren’t really identifying love to the point that it needs to.”

“How old are you, by the way?”

“Twenty three.”

“OK, so at what point did you realize there was a problem?”

“I’d say in the 11th grade, in high school, when I was 17. I started to question my surroundings, my upbringing. I started to understand that there’s more to life than what people think there is. I wanted to change something, I wanted to do something about it.”

“Was there a specific incident…”

“A specific incident… Umm, I’d say my family upbringing. My race being black in America. I realized there was a lot of stereotypes and a lot of racism that I witnessed, and I just didn’t understand why I had to face so much negativity just because of the color of my skin.”

“OK, your high school, what was the percentage of blacks to whites?”

“Umm, I went to a mostly all white high school, so there were very few of us. I don’t know the number, but I’d say, like, 13% maybe.”

“Just 13%?”

“Yeah, I’d say around there.”

“What about your friends? Your closest friends?”

“I have two close friends. They’re black. Actually, we’re in a project together. What I’m doing, myself, is the Human Race Movement, but my team is putting together the Noble Era, noble era dot com, and we’re trying to encourage people to follow their goals and dreams in life. We believe that doing what you love equals happiness.”

“I believe that. So three guys do this?”

“Yeah.”

“And they’re all black?”

“Yup.”

“Why can’t you get white guys to do this?”

“We’re trying to connect. It’s not like we’re not open to anybody, we’re open to everybody, but it’s hard to connect with people nowadays.”

“Did you have problems, uh, having white friends?”

“Oh no, no, absolutely not. One of my best… closest friends is actually white. I haven’t been talking to him all that much. Actually, I should hit him up, contact him to see how he’s doing. But he was a real close friend in high school.”

“So it wasn’t that bad?”

“Oh no, no, not at all.”

“I don’t know, man. I’m just curious…”

“Yeah, yeah…”

“OK, so you’re out of school now?”

“Yeah.”

“What’s your next step?”

“The next step is actually starting the Human Race Movement. From the idea to a non-profit, and I’m talking to a couple of people, and doing some research.”

“OK.”

“So I’m putting that together. The Human Race Movement.”

“OK, and you’re living in Ardmore?”

“Yup.”

“And you’re out of high school?”

“Yup.”

“You’re going to college?”

“No, I’m not going to college, no.”

“You plan on going to college?”

“I’m thinking about it.”

“What would you study if you…”

“I’d probably study, umm, philosophy or… life coaching. Work with kids, in that department.”

“OK… Wow, man, you’re like,” and I started to laugh. “I studied art, you know what I’m saying?”

“Oh yeah?”

“So I’m thinking, man, you’re as impractical as I am. It’s not a judgement call. I’m just saying… I studied painting, and you want to study philosophy, so you’re as impractical as I am. OK, so what about jobs? How are you making money?”

“Umm, right now, I have a go fund me. Donations. That’s how I’m getting the money to help me with the flyers and passing out the posters and everything, but right now I’m actually in the process of looking for a job. I’m in desperate need of a job right now.”

“It’s hard to find work right now.”

“Yeah, it is.”

“What kinds of work have you had in the past?”

“Umm, custodian jobs. Working in, like, a high school and everything.” His voice trailed off.

“A custodian in high school?”

“Uh huh.”

“So how long did you do that?”

“I only did it for a couple of summers. I only did it during the summer time. It was a summer gig.”

“It’s really hard to find work now.”

“It really is.”

“OK, I mean, are you aware that the economy is very bad?”

“Yeah.”

“Really?”

“Yup.”

“Who, I mean… Because the media keep saying it’s not bad, so how do you know that it is bad?”

“Just hearing people complaining about not finding jobs. A lot of people, high school… I mean college graduates struggling to find jobs.”

“OK.”

“You just hear stuff and, you know, doing research and everything.”

“And from personal friends…”

“Absolutely.”

“And relatives.”

“Yeah.”

“Do you think it will get better economically or…”

“Umm, that’s a good question. I don’t think so.”

“You don’t think so?”

“I think economics, in a sense, umm, I think that’s related to love.”

“OK.”

“It’s about how we manage our money. If we don’t have that love, that respect for our fellow man, then we will remain selfish. And when people remain selfish, it’s hard to be giving. We need to be giving… to distribute our wealth.”

“So which comes first? If we don’t have money, we can’t love, right?”

“No, no, no, no… I believe that love has to come first, in all aspects of life. Everything else will follow.”

“I gotcha. All right, so you’re talking about every kind of love.”

“Yes, love in all aspects of life.”

“What about marriage and…”

“Marriage, romantic, friendship, family, all relationships.”

“I know that things have gotten more, umm, let’s say more open, that people believe they don’t have to get married, that they can have multiple lovers…”

“Yeah, I’d say I strongly disagree with that.”

“You disagree with that?”

“Absolutely. I believe that marriage is supposed to be with one person, and it’s supposed to be…”

“Forever.”

“Yes, for eternity. Like I said, most people don’t know what love is, and marriage is founded off of love, and if you don’t know what love is, that foundation is not gonna be found.”

“Is that based on a religion?”

“Ah… no.”

“No?”

“It’s kind of like a Christian based philosophy, but I don’t put it in a religious sense.”

“You’re not a church going guy?”

“No.”

“Were you ever?”

“I don’t think so.”

“You never went…”

“Well, back in the day when I was a little kid.”

“With your parents?”

“Yeah.”

“OK, so… where do you see yourself in ten years?”

“Umm, in ten years, I see… the Human Race Movement established. I have a team go across the country, to be featured in schools. They go into different businesses and talk to different people. I even see them go overseas.”

“Have you had a chance to give a presentation?”

“Actually, a teacher took a flyer, and she told me that me and my friends should put a program together to present to the kids, and so I’m actually working with her right now.”

“And so in ten years, hopefully this movement will spread out?”

“Yup, the Human Race Movement will be established.”

“And you think this will solve a lot of problems?”

“I think it will. Yes, I do.”

“Personally, do you see yourself being married in ten years? Having kids in ten years?”

“I’d love too, but I can’t predict that. I’ll just do my best. If I find somebody that’s suitable for me, I’ll pursue.”

“So, what would you rather have, love in your life or a million dollars in the bank?

“That’s true. That’s why I want to get rid of that. I want love to be first.”

“All right, then, before I leave, is there anything else you want to add?”

“Umm, I want people to understand that we’re all human beings, and to be human means to represent love. We all have the potential and we cannot forget that potential because, like one of my teachers said, we all have the potential to do great and positive things, but a potential means absolutely nothing if it’s not realized.”

“Let me just say something. When people get desperate, as in not having enough money, they can do anything.”

“Absolutely, and that’s why dignity is so important. To a certain extent, we have to conform to a bad situation, but conforming doesn’t mean we have to lose who we are.”

“Yeah.”

“We don’t have to give in to negativity just because we’re surrounded by negativity.”

“But you see, they don’t even call it negativity. They just think it’s survival.”

“Yeah, absolutely.”

“They might even laugh at you by saying, you know, you’re naïve, that you don’t even know how to get by.”

“That’s true, but there is a big difference between surviving in life and living in life.”

1 comment:

man, that is awesome, thanks linh. i loved this guy and his message, written in reality and truth as well as in his interview. i am reminded of me at that age, to be quite honest. so refreshing to see for me. thanks again

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About Me

Born in Vietnam in 1963, I came to the US in 1975, and have also lived in Italy, England and Germany. I'm the author of a non-fiction book, Postcards from the End of America (2017), two books of stories, Fake House (2000) and Blood and Soap (2004), six of poems, All Around What Empties Out (2003), American Tatts (2005), Borderless Bodies (2006), Jam Alerts (2007), Some Kind of Cheese Orgy (2009) and A Mere Rica (2017), and a novel, Love Like Hate (2010). I've been anthologized in Best American Poetry 2000, 2004, 2007, Great American Prose Poems from Poe to the Present, Postmodern American Poetry: a Norton Anthology (vol. 2) and Flash Fiction International: Very Short Stories From Around the World, etc. I'm also editor of Night, Again: Contemporary Fiction from Vietnam (1996) and The Deluge: New Vietnamese Poetry (2013). My writing has been translated into Italian, Spanish, French, Dutch, German, Portuguese, Japanese, Korean, Arabic, Icelandic and Finnish, and I've been invited to read in London, Cambridge, Brighton, Paris, Berlin, Leipzig, Halle, Reykjavik, Toronto, Singapore and all over the US. I've also published widely in Vietnamese.